Grass is in my opinion the hardest thing to do...but doing small tiles like yours, it's not such a big deal, same with the trees
Important stuff about grass is the remaining grassy look and getting rid of some grid that appears when the tile is overused...
The best grass tile example is either SD3 or Sword of Mana...
I myself am working and redoing my tiles for my game I worked on ages ago and I keep having problems with grass or other repitative patterns
(from right to left (left being the current WIP)
Just saying, if you want a very good result, you should redo stuff alot, or make alot of designs, then stick with it.
For your palette problem, it always depends what kind of game you want, what atmosphere, what daytime...many factors influence the sheme...
Always think of the psychological aspects that your "game" has, what aimed target group, and whatsoever, if it's dramatic (working with strong highlights and other lightsources) and other kinds!
Aswell, a sidenote...don't detail your trees before they don't look "right"
Use primary colors to sketch them, sort of, and when they look right, keep the overall view and don't go too deep into detail to lose focus of the entire shape
But the more you practice, the better you get...I've done countless of tree/wood designs to improve
2007
2008
(started like this:
)
Just make sure you fuse everything with the floor!
